Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Saturday, January 14, 2023

01/14 Links: Israel must prepare for collapse of Palestinian Authority; 'Unacceptable': Biden Administration Opposes Jewish Prayer at Jerusalem Holy Site

From Ian:

Israel must prepare for collapse of Palestinian Authority

After months of tension and violence between Israel and the Palestinians, a new political reality is threatening to push the Palestinian Authority (PA) to the brink of collapse.

Both sides have been warning of an impending collapse for some time now. While these warnings are not new, circumstances have changed and may pose a significant threat to the stability of the already fragile Palestinian entity.

“Such threats have been heard for years, but have yet to materialize,” said Dr. Nimrod Goren, president of Mitvim – The Israeli Institute for Regional Foreign Policies and senior fellow for Israeli Affairs at the Middle East Institute. “Therefore, people might not believe them anymore and become indifferent toward dramatic events that may be looming.”

The PA was established in 1994 and is controlled by the Fatah Party after a split from Hamas in 2007. Led by President Mahmoud Abbas, the PA has full control of West Bank territory referred to as Area A and partial civil control over areas B and C, in which Israel maintains most of the control. Hamas controls the Gaza Strip.

Over time, Abbas’ power has eroded. A policy led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has consistently weakened the PA while strengthening Hamas in Gaza. Abbas’ legitimacy among the Palestinian people gradually decreased. His continuous postponement of elections in the PA has significantly damaged his standing.

Hence, the threats to the PA are numerous and its collapse could come as a result of several different scenarios. An escalation in violence with Israel or a decision by Abbas to announce the dissolution of the PA as he has so often threatened, could both signal the end. Meanwhile, internal chaos due to a power struggle following Abbas’ departure could topple the PA. This could happen before or after the death of the 87-year-old leader.

“As long as Abbas is alive, the PA will survive. Once he is no longer in power, the PA will be on the brink of collapse,” according to Mkhaimar Abusada, an associate professor and chairman of the department of political science at Al-Azhar University in Gaza. “We could see Palestinian infighting and Israeli intervention. This is the scary point, where concern for the future of the PA would be very real.”

It is not only Israeli actions, but also the internal Palestinian rift between Fatah and Hamas that have chewed away at the power and legitimacy of the PA.

In addition, after a lengthy period of violence between the sides, a new right-wing Israeli government is threatening stability in the area. Last week’s decision by the new government to sanction the PA over its referral to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) on the legality of Israel’s presence in the West Bank could further weaken the PA.

All the while, security coordination between Israel and the PA has been largely unhindered. For Abbas, it helps to maintain his power and, for Israel, it allows access to the territories and the terror infrastructure. These mutual interests have thus far provided a solid guarantee of their continuation, as well as a critical lifeline for the PA.

Yet after a deadly year of violence in the West Bank, the outlook is grim.

“At some point, when the number of incidents will amass, the security coordination will no longer be effective and then the gradual collapse we are seeing now could lead to a full collapse,” Dr. Ely Karmon, a senior research scholar at the International Policy Institute for Counter Terrorism at Reichman University, told The Media Line.

Khaled Abu Toameh: Does Netanyahu want a weakening, or a total collapse, of the PA?

IT’S HARD to assess the extent of the damage the Israeli sanctions will cause the PA. In the past, withholding tax revenues did not result in the collapse of the PA. Nor did the former Donald Trump administration’s decision to cut off financial aid to the Palestinians bring about the downfall of the PA or force it to change its policies.

Admittedly, the Israeli and US measures aggravated the financial crisis for the Palestinians, but the PA managed to weather the storm, thanks primarily to the Biden administration’s decision to resume financial aid to the Palestinians. The Palestinian leadership also benefited from the relatively moderate approach of the Israeli security and political establishment under the previous government headed by Naftali Bennett and Yair Lapid.

Abbas and his entourage are now beginning to realize that the honeymoon with Israel has ended. Nevertheless, they are still pinning hope on the Biden administration and other international parties to exert pressure on Israel to prevent it from crossing the redlines.

The feeling in Ramallah is that the presence of Ben-Gvir and Smotrich in the government will actually facilitate the Palestinians’ mission to alienate Israel in the media and increase the pressure from the international community on the Netanyahu government.

The Israeli decision to seize and withhold Palestinian funds appears, for now, to be the most painful of the current punishments for Ramallah. The Palestinians, naturally, are significantly less worried about the confiscation of VIP cards from a number of officials or even the decision to freeze construction in Area C, where they are anyway not waiting for Israeli permission to build homes.

A number of Palestinian officials who spoke to The Jerusalem Post in the past few days confided that they are still trying to ascertain the Israeli government’s ultimate goal.

They admitted that they are uncertain whether the government is seeking to undermine the PA or to bring about its total collapse.

But the officials were all in agreement that the actions and rhetoric of the Netanyahu government will exacerbate tensions between Israel and the Palestinians, and most likely lead to an outburst of large-scale violence in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. They also agreed that the Palestinians’ diplomatic and legal campaign against Israel has a greater chance of success given the nature of the right-wing coalition in Israel.

“The actions of the extremist government in Israel are a clear indication that we are headed toward an explosion,” said a senior official with the Palestinian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. “Of course, the sanctions will hurt us, but on the other hand they will increase our chances of winning worldwide support and sympathy.”

The Israelis, the official added, “need to understand that weakening the Palestinian Authority is the biggest gift to Hamas, Islamic Jihad and Iran. They need to understand that getting rid of the Palestinian Authority means that Israel will have to return to the Palestinian cities and towns and run the schools and hospitals and collect the garbage there. They also need to understand that halting the security coordination would be bad for both the Palestinian Authority and Israel.”

'Unacceptable': Biden Administration Opposes Jewish Prayer at Jerusalem Holy Site

The Biden administration says it would be "unacceptable" for Israel to end the restriction on Jewish prayer at the Temple Mount and it would oppose any effort to disrupt the "historic status quo" that only allows Muslims to pray at the site. The stance is a blow to diplomatic relations between the United States and the newly installed Israeli government and signals the Biden administration intends to call out the Jewish state on issues other administrations might address behind closed doors.

When asked by the Washington Free Beacon this week if the Biden administration would back changes proposed by conservative Israeli leaders that would allow Jews to pray at the holy site revered by both Muslims and Jews, a State Department spokesman said it is "unacceptable" for Israel to depart from longstanding policies.

"The United States stands firmly for preservation of the historic status quo with respect to the holy sites in Jerusalem," the spokesman said. "Any unilateral actions that depart from the historic status quo is unacceptable."

The Biden administration’s tough diplomatic stance is leading to concerns about a growing rift between the United States and Israel. President Joe Biden sparked criticism last year when he did not immediately phone Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu to congratulate him on his election win, which observers saw as a sign of chilly relations between the world leaders. The Biden administration also launched an FBI investigation into the death of a Palestinian-American journalist, despite Israel and the State Department determining the killing was accidental. Secretary of State Antony Blinken was also dispatched in early December to headline a conference organized by J Street, a leading anti-Israel group working to oppose Netanyahu’s government.

The Biden administration’s willingness to join the international chorus of Israel bashers has sparked outrage among pro-Israel lawmakers in Congress and former U.S. officials who see the United States as distancing itself from the Jewish state.

"Should it really be this difficult for the U.S. government to publicly affirm that Jews have a right to visit the holiest site in their religion?" said Richard Goldberg, a former White House National Security Council official who serves as a senior adviser to the Foundation for Defense of Democracies think tank. "Is the policy of the State Department: Freedom of religion for all except Jews?"

01/13 Links Pt2: Amnesty International’s latest excuse to accuse Israel of ‘apartheid’; Harvard didn’t cancel Kenneth Roth; it decided not to honor an antisemite

From Ian:

Ruthie Blum: Amnesty International’s latest excuse to accuse Israel of ‘apartheid’

Protests against new government bolster Amnesty and its friends
Israeli demonstrations in which participants compare the new government to the rise of the Third Reich do Amnesty and ilk proud, particularly when Palestinian flags dot the scenery. Those in attendance may profess to be protesting Team Netanyahu’s judicial-reform plan and other policies, but what they’re actually doing is discrediting the essence of the country.

This was evident a few weeks ago at a conference in Damascus, organized by the Hamas-affiliated Al-Quds International Institute. According to the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI), the event brought together Syria-based Palestinian activists and Iranian dignitaries to discuss Israel’s demise.

One noteworthy speech reported on by MEMRI was that of Syrian researcher Shadi Diab. He presented “data” on the “demographic problem facing the [Israeli] entity, and its failure to achieve harmony among its [Jewish] residents, who immigrated [to it] from different parts of the world and have different identities, cultures and languages, different circumstances and widely differing goals.”

This “entity,” he argued, “never managed to achieve a consensus among these sectors, who came from all over the world, and this disparity is evident in the struggle and fierce competition that currently prevail in the political arena and in the government of this entity, between the various political, ethnic and religious sectors, such as the Ashkenazi, Sephardi and haredi [Jews], between Right and Left, between religious and secular people, between the civilian and military sectors, etc.”

It sounds as though his “research” consisted of reading the Israeli press. He couldn’t admit to this, though, since he proceeded to claim that the “Zionist media conceals these struggles and disagreements and prevents [the publication of] any information about them inside and outside the [Zionist] entity.”

This contention is even more hilarious than Amnesty’s definition of free speech. But neither is a laughing matter when seen in a broader context: the holistic effort to annihilate Israel through external means, such as weapons and delegitimization, and contribute to its self-implosion. Due to ongoing Palestinian terrorism against innocent Israelis, the “peace process” was barely mentioned, even by the Left, during the election campaign. The Right emerged victorious by emphasizing Zionism and Jewish sovereignty as values whose positive connotations need to be restored and nurtured.

It’s a shame that the disgruntled losers aren’t open to the possibility that this will be to their benefit, as well. It’s far worse that they’re offering both fodder and hope to those who don’t distinguish between Ben-Gvir and Ben-Gurion.

MEMRI: Empty Vessels Looking To Belong

Sometimes the search for identity can go from bad to worse, whether it be children lamenting having mutilated themselves in bouts of sexual experimentation, the bleak nihilism of American teenage mass shooters, or Westerners desperately shopping for new racial or religious identities. California teen detransitioner Chloe Cole, who had her breasts removed at the age of 15, compares the transition surgery of minors to Nazi medical experiments.[8] There are apparently at least 72 genders to choose from, as well as more than a few cases of white people in America seeking to reinvent themselves into higher-status Black or Indigenous personae.[9]

The challenges are not limited to the West. Urbanization and modernity have been major social challenges in the developing world for decades, and particularly destructive to traditional societies uprooted by rapid change. In Israel, the country's Bedouin population has experienced massive upheaval as they are settled in new towns built in the Negev. Faced with a disruption in their traditional lifestyle, poverty, and crime, many have embraced political Islam as a safe haven in times of uncertainty and upheaval. Proof of this is the large number of mosques that have been built during this accelerated process of urbanization. The Bedouin, who historically have not been characterized by devout Islamism, are mentally crushed by this process, during which they are losing their way of life and their identity. As a result, they cleave to Islam to hold them together from within.

Where it can maintain any sort of real vitality and solidity in the face of our liquid future, traditional religion (or new faiths) will remain somewhat of a refuge from such nihilistic darkness. Ours is a metaphysical dilemma and it requires metaphysical responses. It seems hard to be a centrist when the center does not hold, when the middle ground of supposed liberal reason is excavated out from under you. But one of the risks of opposing the zeitgeist by finding supposed refuges that seem the furthest removed or most intransigent from the spirit of the age is that of extremism.

The controversial, resolutely anti-modern former kickboxer turned misogynist influencer Andrew Tate, now under arrest for human trafficking in Romania, recently described Islam , to which he recently converted, as "the last religion, the last one, because no other religion has boundaries which they will enforce. If you will tolerate everything, then you stand for nothing."[10] Europe-based Islamic reformer Hamed Abdel-Samad, in contrast to Tate, sees contemporary conservative Islam as increasingly "dwindling."[11] Tate seems to have taken a faith journey, if you can call it that in such a singular personality, that went from nominal Christian to Romanian Orthodox to Islam.[12] Still, to be Amish or Benedictine or Chasidic is also to be in clear contradistinction to an unmoored world. But then so is being a white supremacist or a jihadist.[13]

In the United Kingdom, Gen X (she was born in 1968) Sally-Anne Jones went from nominal Christian to punk rock to witchcraft and alternative lifestyles to not just converting to Islam but to becoming a highly successful recruiter for the Islamic State.[14] Less than a decade ago, tens of thousands of other Westerners, both converts and cradle Muslims, were motivated to leave the West and seek to emigrate to ISIS territory, where their lives were in constant danger.

More recently, in 2018, 17-year-old Corey Johnson of Jupiter, Florida decided to become a Muslim by watching ISIS videos and reading the Quran, though he seems never to have actually interacted with a live Muslim. Johnson seems like a Generation Z poster boy for our time – no father, "above-average intelligence but delayed maturity, autism, and severe mental illness," depression, prescription medications, stalking on social media.[15] For the supposed sake of Islam, he stabbed a 13-year-old boy to death and attempted to kill two other people one night during a sleepover. Before Islam, he had been infatuated with Hitler and Stalin, with white supremacists. He supported the Oklahoma City bombing (which took place five years before he was born). He had a swastika on his Facebook profile. During his trial in November 2021 in Florida, his defense attorneys described him as an "empty vessel looking to belong."[16] Despite expressing remorse, he was sentenced to life in prison at the age of 21.

In this new age of fervid identity seeking, the state in the West and many legacy institutions, their own foundations shaken, are mostly either absent or, in many ways, seeking to be relevant by promoting the latest thing. Many will be swept along with the latest enthusiasm, the last mirage, which will constantly need to be reinvented and repackaged to give the impression of progress. The Cult of the New will be regularly appeased. Others will often feel that they are on their own, redundant or alienated, alone before the winds of rapidly accelerating change, alone before the darkness. In them will remain the spark of authentic rebellion. Instead of seeking utopia, the imperative will be a search for communities which seem to offer safe harbor – or the illusion of a safe harbor.

Jonathan Tobin: Harvard didn’t cancel Kenneth Roth; it decided not to honor an antisemite

Roth is a prodigious fundraiser. HRW was rewarded for his calumnies against Israel with a $100 million grant from left-wing billionaire George Soros’s Open Society Foundation. Though some on the left treat any criticism of Soros as evidence of Jew hatred, his support for anti-Israel and even antisemitic activism aimed at supporting the Jewish state’s destruction renders their claims risible.

But Roth is also a terrible hypocrite when it comes to raising money. He solicited a $470 million donation from a Saudi billionaire, and in return promised not to advocate for LGBTQ rights in Muslim countries. Many on the left consider those who cite the fact that Israel is the one country in the Middle East where gays have equal rights (Amir Ohana, the new speaker of Israel’s Knesset, is gay) to be “pinkwashing.” But Roth was prepared to sacrifice the rights of Muslim gays in order to get more cash with which to attack the Jewish state’s existence.

An honest assessment of Roth’s record must lead to the conclusion that he isn’t a “critic” of Israel’s, but rather someone who regards its existence as a crime that must be atoned for by its destruction. His lies about Israel and willingness to deny Jews rights he wouldn’t deny to anyone else isn’t merely a controversial opinion; it’s a virulent variant of antisemitism.

He wouldn’t be the only one with such vile opinions to be given a prestigious perch at an elite university. But it is to the credit of Harvard’s Kennedy School that it drew the line at giving him the kind of honor he clearly doesn’t deserve.

Contrary to the arguments of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE), a group that has stood up in the past for conservatives, the issue at Harvard isn’t the defense of academic freedom, but normalizing Jew-hatred.

In a saner environment than the one that currently exists in academia and the establishment media, it would be the University of Pennsylvania under fire from faculty, students, alumni and the public for honoring an antisemite like Roth. Instead, it is Harvard’s Elmendorf who is under intolerable pressure to reverse his stand and give Roth yet another platform to advance his campaign to treat Zionism, the national liberation movement of the Jewish people, as racism.

That the organized Jewish community has had little to say about Roth and the attacks on Harvard’s stand against antisemitism also provides more proof of the failure of American-Jewish leaders and their preference for liberal causes that do nothing to protect the rights or the security of the community they purport to represent.

Rather than meekly accept his claims of martyrdom, those who profess to care about fighting Jew-hatred need to put aside political differences and join in an effort to call him out for his lies. If Harvard is ultimately forced to surrender on this issue, it will be a triumph for Roth’s brand of left-wing antisemitism that is a growing threat to the ability of Jews to speak up for Israel and Zionism in the public square, and especially in academia.

Indeed, it isn’t Kenneth Roth who’s being canceled, but all those who are willing to tell the truth about the leftist war on Israel and the Jews.

Shot - Chaser @BostonGlobe @thecrimson @Harvard @Kennedy_School @CarrCenter pic.twitter.com/E7tiXqaAga
— Faith Quintero (@FaithQuintero7) January 12, 2023

The assertion that Arabs are only anti-Zionist, not antisemitic, often has its challenges.

The leader of the Houthi Ansar Allah movement in Yemen, Abd al-Malik Badr al-Din al-Houthi, gave a speech for the Muslim version of International Women's Day.

Al Houthi said, "the global Zionist-Jewish lobby seeks by targeting women to target the structure of society and dismantle the bonds of human society and the family," explaining that the demonic, corrupting Jews target women to corrupt them and seeks to turn them into a tool to corrupt society.

And he explained that the Jews seek to spread corruption more than ever before, and they use all means and capabilities for that.

So, anti-Zionist or antisemitic? It's a real conundrum.

Buy the EoZ book, PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism today at Amazon!

Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424.

Read all about it here!

01/13 Links Pt1: At the United Nations, Israel is ‘the Jew Among the Nations’; Joe Biden’s condescension toward Israel; Why ban the PLO - and Confederate - flags?

From Ian:

At the United Nations, Israel is ‘the Jew Among the Nations’

Approximately half of the council’s country-specific condemnations have targeted Israel. Nine out of its 35 special sessions have focused on the Jewish state. The UNHRC created a blacklist to deter investment in territories controlled by Israel, something it has not done for any other disputed territory. And the UNHRC maintains a special rapporteur devoted to uncovering supposed Israeli abuses. The list goes on.

Special rapporteurs are expected to demonstrate “impartiality” and not “hold any views or opinions that could prejudice” their work. Nevertheless, like flies to manure, this special rapporteur position has attracted individuals with histories of anti-Israel activism — and even antisemitism.

In 2008, then rapporteur John Dugard justified Palestinian terrorism as the “inevitable consequence” of Israeli actions. His successor, Richard Falk, likened Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians to the Holocaust. Falk’s antisemitism was so pronounced that the United Kingdom condemned him on three separate occasions.

Current special rapporteur Francesca Albanese is embroiled in her own antisemitism controversy. Last month, Albanese’s 2014 remarks describing the United States as “subjugated by the Jewish lobby” drew widespread condemnation, including by top US officials. In a separate post from that year, Albanese claimed that the “Israeli lobby,” directed by “Israel’s greed,” skewed media coverage of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Though Albanese tried to distance herself from her past remarks, in July 2022, she defended another UN official who similarly claimed that the “Jewish lobby” controls the media.

Albanese has also doubled and tripled down on opposing the leading benchmark for identifying anti-Jewish prejudice, claiming it stifles free speech. In its definition of antisemitism, the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA), a coalition of 35 member states and eight observers, provided examples to help understand how antisemitism manifests itself. Prior to her appointment, Albanese had made comments that likely fell under two IHRA examples of antisemitism: comparing Israel to the Nazis and declaring Israel to be a racist endeavor.

Congress can help stamp out the UN’s anti-Jewish bigotry by defunding any UN agency that supports or engages in antisemitism pursuant to the IHRA definition.

Whether by removing Iran from the UN’s women’s commission, implementing human rights standards for UNHRC membership, or barring antisemites and anti-Israel activists from UN positions focused on Israel, the United States should work to prevent arsonists from serving as fire chiefs at the UN. With one fire put out for now, Washington should turn its attention to the others.

Mark Regev: Israel and Jordan: A troubled peace

Despite Hussein’s much-cultivated image as the Arab world’s foremost moderate leader, he refused to support Anwar Sadat’s 1977 peace initiative, never closing the door to peace, but neither embracing it.

This changed with the 1993 Israel-Palestinian Oslo Accords, which gave the king the pretext to normalize ties; Hussein and Rabin signed the Israel-Jordan Wadi Araba peace treaty the following year.

Hussein’s personal commitment to a reconciliation was demonstrated in March 1997 after the murder of seven Beit Shemesh schoolgirls by a Jordanian soldier at Naharayim on the Israel-Jordan border.

The king paid condolence visits to each of the bereaved families – his behavior touching the hearts of Israelis, while antagonizing many of his own countrymen (those opposing normalization criticized him for “kneeling before the Jews”).

But despite the early optimism, Israel-Jordan relations deteriorated into a cold peace. Jordanians accused Israel of not fulfilling promises for cooperation and for never sufficiently considering Jordanian sensitivities.

Particularly irking for Jordan was the Mossad’s 1997 botched assassination of Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal in Amman, and Jerusalem’s 2017 celebration of the Israeli security guard who shot dead two Jordanians during a terror attack at an embassy residence.

For some Jordanians, fears persist that Israel continues to see Jordan as the alternative Palestinian homeland – ideas that had been expressed by the younger Ariel Sharon (who later gained much respect in Amman for his championing of Israel-Jordan ties).

Israel's new partners
JERUSALEM, TOO, has its grievances. Whatever Israel did – whether providing water above and beyond the commitment made in the peace treaty, or supplying low-cost Mediterranean gas – such support was never adequately acknowledged in Amman.

Israel was also disappointed when Jordan refused to use its professed moderating influence to help diffuse potentially dangerous situations, especially when events on the Temple Mount seemed to be escalating.

The 2020 Abraham Accords with the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain left Jordan feeling sidelined, with Israel supposedly embracing new peace partners at the expense of its older one.

In July 2021, prime minister Naftali Bennett reportedly met with Jordan’s King Abdullah in secret, raising questions as to why, despite the formally normalized relations, Amman still insists on a clandestine meeting.

This week, when Middle East peace partners Bahrain, Egypt, Israel, Morocco and the UAE met in Abu Dhabi for a Negev Forum meeting, Jordan was once again absent.

For domestic reasons, Amman remains acutely responsive to Palestinian sentiment. Given that an Israeli-Palestinian breakthrough is unlikely to happen anytime soon, Israel-Jordan ties will be condemned to the back burner.

Why ban the PLO - and Confederate - flags?

Palestinian Arabs are angry that the Israeli authorities are prohibiting the display of the flag of “Palestine” at public events. The Israelis say the flag is being used to inspire violence. On both sides of this debate, everyone understands that a flag can be a powerful symbol—for good, or for evil. Flags mean something.

Think about the power of Betsy Ross’s iconic flag in the American Revolution. Or the GIs raising the Stars and Stripes at Iwo Jima. It isn’t just a piece of fabric. It stands for something much bigger.

The Jewish Legion, which fought as part of the British army in World War I, had its own flag with a Star of David. So did the Jewish Brigade that fought in World War II.

By contrast, think of the power of Nazi Germany’s swastika flag, or the Soviet Union’s hammer and sickle. Think about what those revolting symbols meant to the people whom those regimes oppressed.

As for the “Flag of Palestine,” the fact that there are conflicting accounts of its origin is itself rather telling. A separate, identifiable nation with a documented history knows where its flag came from. But throughout history, there has never been a sovereign “State of Palestine,” so the flag they use today is not the flag of some former kingdom or state of theirs.

Instead, it was designed either by an Arab literary club in Turkey in 1909, or an Arab youth group in France in 1911, or by an official of the British Foreign Office, depending on which account you believe. Either way, it was not designed by a “Palestinian,” because in those days, the Arabs living in the Holy Land didn’t call themselves Palestinians.

In 1917, the flag was proclaimed as the “Flag of the Arab Revolt” (against the Turks) by Hussein bin Ali, the king of Hejaz—that is, the Saudi Arabian peninsula. Again, not a Palestinian, and not the flag of “Palestine.”

The Arab League began calling it the “Flag of Palestine” in 1948. Note the date. The flag represented an imaginary “Palestine” which consisted of all of the newly created State of Israel. It was not the flag of the not-yet-occupied “West Bank.” Jordan ruled that territory.

When the Palestine Liberation Organization was established in 1964, it adopted the “Flag of Palestine.” Again, notice the date. The “West Bank” was, at that time, occupied by those Palestinian Arabs who had started calling themselves Jordanians. The PLO flag was the symbol of a terrorist group that was dedicated to destroying all of Israel and replacing it with “Palestine.”

Watch: Dr. Mordechai Kedar, a Middle East expert studied in the Qur'an, describes invention of the connection of Islam to Jerusalem. pic.twitter.com/eX8mqZXDHT
— Corrected Media (@correctedmedia) January 13, 2023

Anti-Zionists like the extremist, fringe Neturei Karta sect because they share the ir desire to destroy Israel and the embrace terrorists. But the real reason they love them is because they use them as evidence that they are not antisemitic - after all, they like some Jews!

It's a stupid game, but it is one that both sides can play.

From Times of Israel:

Police on Thursday said officers arrested a man who entered the Jenin refugee camp in the northern West Bank earlier this week along with two other members of the fringe anti-Zionist, ultra-Orthodox sect Neturei Karta, and met with Palestinians from local terror groups.

Elhanan Lax, 38, from the central city of Petah Tikva, was detained on suspicion of “supporting and associating with a terror group” and illegally entering Area A of the West Bank, where Jenin is located. Israeli citizens are barred from entering Area A, as it is under the Palestinian Authority’s civilian and security control under the Oslo Accords.

The three men were filmed meeting with prominent Palestinian Islamic Jihad terror group officials as well as families of terrorist attackers on Monday.

Police said they are seeking to arrest the other two men. The trio could face lengthy prison spells if convicted of supporting terror.

Hold on - I thought that Israel was all about Jewish supremacy! About anti-Palestinian racism! How could Israel arrest fellow Jews, and threaten them with long prison terms, when they only treat Palestinians that way?

Moreover, how could Israel ban Jews from Area A? Arab Israelis can, and do, go to Palestinian controlled areas all the time. Isn't that the exact opposite of Jewish supremacy?

By the logic of the anti-Israel crowd themselves, Israel cannot be racist - just as the Israel haters use the NK idiots as proof that they cannot be antisemitic.

Buy the EoZ book, PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism today at Amazon!

Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424.

Read all about it here!

What we can (and cannot) learn about US Leftist antisemitism in the @ADL report

The ADL has released a report, "Antisemitic Attitudes in America," that is making headines today becasue it indicates that antisemitic attitudes in the US are increasing dramatically.

Over three-quarters of Americans (85 percent) believe at least one anti-Jewish trope, as opposed to 61 percent found in 2019. Twenty percent of Americans believe six or more tropes, which is significantly more than the 11 percent that ADL found in 2019 and is the highest level measured in decades.

Many Americans believe in Israel-oriented antisemitic positions – from 40 percent who at least slightly believe that Israel treats Palestinians like Nazis treated the Jews, to 18 percent who are uncomfortable spending time with a person who supports Israel.

There is a nearly 40 percent correlation between belief in anti-Jewish tropes and anti-Israel belief, meaning that a substantial number of people who believe anti-Jewish tropes also have negative attitudes toward Israel.

This is the first of a series of reports by the ADL based on this survey; a future report will compare antisemitic and anti-Israel opinions across the political and ideological spectrum.

So while the overlap of anti-Israel and antisemitic attitudes would initially appear to show that Leftist anti-Zionism is correlated with antisemitism, we cannot make that conclusion, since traditional antisemites generally also hate Israel (as much as the Left tries to claim that they are Zionist.) If virtually all far-Right antisemites are also anti-Israel, the 40% correlation could be accurate without any Leftist (traditional) antisemites.

However, even if we assume that the overlap of classic antisemitic and modern anti-Israel opinions occur exclusively on the Right, we can still infer something about Leftist contributions to antisemitic attitudes in the US from the specific questions asked:

Some of these reflect current far-Left antisemitic discourse more than traditional far-Right applying their existing antisemitism to Israel. It may reflect that the far-Left anti-Zionism contributes to far-Right antisemitic rhetoric.

And indeed we have seen that in the past. The most extreme far-Right antisemitic publications enthusiastically and prolifically quote from far-Left sources like Mondoweiss, Electronic Intifada and Max Blumenthal.

So while we cannot conclude that the far Left shares antisemitic attitudes with the far Right, there are definitely connections and influences, and this may be one reason the general index of antisemitic attitudes in the US is going up.

But this is in many ways the entire question misses the point.

One reason that my algorithmic definition of antisemitism is (IMHO) the best out there is that it does not show bias against, even implicitly, the political attitudes of the antisemites.

The ADL's correlation is important, but it says nothing about causation.

Since the Left self-defines as anti-racist and socialist, it is emotionally invested in the appearances of treating everyone equally, so certainly their attitudes in any poll will reflect that self-perception. Which means that the ADL methodology, as well-intentioned as it is, has a fatal flaw.

It doesn't take into account the history of antisemitism and how it has changed over the centuries.

It started off as being against a people (this week's Torah portion includes the first expression of antisemitism in history: "“Look, the Israelite people ....may join our enemies in fighting against us....”) Christian antisemitism opposed Jews as a religion and as a people. "Scientific" antisemitism introduced the concept of hating Jews as an inferior race. Conspiracy theory antisemitism groups Jews together as planning to take over the world. And modern antisemitism ascribes all evil to the Jewish state and its supporters.

The commonalities dwarf the differences. For all of them, the "new" antisemites regarded their predecessors with some contempt, as a primitive example of bigotry unlike the newer, enlightened version.

For all of them, there were differences in which Jews were included as objects of hate. For all of them, some "good Jews" tried to ingratiate themselves with the new antisemites, and similarly the antisemites would embrace the "good Jews" as a shield to claim that they weren't bigots. For all of them, the Jews represented what the antisemites hated the most in the world.

And for all of them, the vast majority of Jews in the world by any definition are framed as evil.

People wouldn't be antisemitic if they didn't get something out of it. Antisemitism is attractive because it is a simple explanation for the ills of the world. It is attractive because the antisemites can use others as scapegoats for their own shortcomings. It is attractive for the simple reason that people want to feel superior to others. For antisemites, modern and classic, Jews represent what they hate most.

If racism is the biggest evil, then Jews must be the biggest racists - but the new antisemites cannot admit that they are the ones being bigoted. Their hate is different, they want to believe, because it is anchored in ethics.

But psychically, the hate is the same. It is just as toxic, just as irrational, and just as based on easily provable lies.

The ADL, by trying to find correlation between the latest flavor of antisemitism and the older versions, does not take into account that the new antisemites specifically define themselves as impervious to bigotry, and will naturally try to avoid appearing to be one of the distasteful types of antisemites that their political enemies embrace. But of one could do a brain scan of their emotional state when they think of Israel, it would be identical to that of the KKK when thinking of Jews.

The ADL could prove this pretty easily. They could rephrase some of their questions to refer to Zionists, not Jews:

Zionists are not as honest in their business dealings as other businesspeople.

Zionists are not warm and friendly.

Zionists have a lot of irritating faults.

Zionists are more willing than others to use shady practices to get what they want.

Zionists have too much power in the United States today.

Zionists don’t care what happens to anyone but their own kind.

Zionists have too much power in the business world.

Zionists do not share my values.

Zionists are more loyal to Israel than to America.

Zionists stick together more than other Americans.

And this is only a list of tropes that apply to traditional antisemitism. Like all previous versions, modern antisemites have added new antisemitic tropes. The ADL could add:

Zionists tend to be more racist than other Americans.

Zionists support Jewish supremacy in Israel.

Zionists are sympathetic towards right wing antisemites.

Zionists accuse all critics of Israel of being antisemitic.

Zionists use antisemitism as a means to control Americans.

If the Leftist attitude towards "Zionists" mirror that of the Rightist attitude towards "Jews," then we would have very convincing evidence that anti-Zionism is just a new form of antisemitism.

Buy the EoZ book, PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism today at Amazon!

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For years, Iranian media has been in the forefront of spreading classic antisemitism - at the same time as insisting that they have only respect for Jews.

How do they do this?

By finding the worst Western antisemites and highlighting what they have to say.

This way they can spread antisemitism and claim that they are simply reporting what Westerners are saying.

Here's the latest example, and its a doozy. MEMRI summarizes the interview:

On January 4 and January 8, 2023, Channel 4 (Iran) aired an interview with British Bishop Richard Nelson Williamson. Williamson said that the Jews control the media, that they "twist" people's minds, and that they have cleverly taken control of universities and the media. He also said that the Holocaust was a "myth", that the Jews have replaced "objective" history with their "emotional scenario" about the Holocaust, and that only around 100,000 Jews were actually killed.

Mocking Holocaust survivors, Bishop Williamson said: "I was there and I saw it, when the Hungarian [Jews] were being burned it was green smoke and when the Czechs were being burned it was red smoke." In addition, he said that the Jews created the Freemasons so that gentiles bring "Jewish corruption" into Christian society, and he claimed that the Jews have "infiltrated" the U.S. government and were behind 9/11, the war in Ukraine, and the JFK assassination. Bishop Williamson has been convicted of Holocaust denial in Germany and was excommunicated by the Catholic Church in 2009, he was reinstated by the Church in 2009, and excommunicated once again in 2015.

There's far more. Jews learn evil from the Devil, they control the media, they are behind all wars, they are racists, they twist the truth...it is an unreal display of antisemitism.

Buy the EoZ book, PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism today at Amazon!

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Read all about it here!

01/12 Links Pt2: ADL: Number of Americans believing antisemitic stereotypes nearly doubled since 2019; Jews who defend antisemites

From Ian:

Karol Markowicz: The New Jew

The New Jew remembers the Taffy Brodesser-Akner piece about how support for Israel is no longer in fashion on the left, how “we whispered to each other that it felt like the anti-Israel sentiment was actually a new way of being openly anti-Semitic, somehow wrapping it up in a Democratic cause” and how that piece made him sad. Today it would make him angry. How dare the mealy-mouthed left question the existence of the only Jewish state? We're done explaining anything to anyone anymore.

When someone is found to be a Jew-hater (a term far preferable to the clunky “antisemite”) he thinks “please, just don’t take them to the Holocaust museum.” Having to prove our humanity to people who hate us is embarrassing and the New Jew refuses to do it. We are not here to beg “please don’t hate us” and show them how much we have been hated by others. We’re here to say we mean “Never Again.” We’re here to boo when you think we won’t have guns to protect ourselves.

Her favorite Jewish organization is Tikvah because they didn’t flinch when the Museum of Jewish Heritage in Manhattan demanded they disinvite Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis from their Jewish Leadership Conference. The boldness was appealing. The event went on, the protestors impotently raged outside, and the Jews inside got to say: we invite who we want.

The New Jew furtively discusses admiration for Bari Weiss if she’s at the beginning of her journey away from the left and brazenly Ben Shapiro if she’s exited the building.

Religiously, the New Jew is either Orthodox or shul-less. She noticed that Reform and Conservative synagogues stayed closed for too long during Covid and when they re-emerged they were temples to leftism not G-d. She fills in her worship at Chabad, because they’ll never turn Shabbat into a struggle session, but it’s not an exact fit. The shuls will get there. They’ll have to. Their empty pews will be their signal.

She has broken with Facebook or Instagram friends who said vile things about Israel while Jews hid from bombs in basements in Tel Aviv. He has looked at his family, or dreamed about the one he hopes to have, and said "Not us. Not ever."

He discovers there are many others like him, so many others, and they’re welcoming and accepting as we all navigate together being independent Jews in the freest of countries.

The gun booing was telling because it wasn't about quietly owning a firearm. It was about letting others know that you do. It was about standing up for that right, standing up against the idea that our people will always be sitting ducks. We will not be.

A real political realignment to accompany this shift is coming. It is not here yet. One issue, like support for Israel, often leads to change on other issues, like gun rights. One little time you pull out a thread and where has it led? The whole shawl of Jews-always-being-liberals unravels.

Israel is an imperfect example but it's still instructive. Israel was once a left-leaning country. It is not today. The shift runs parallel to what is happening with Jews in America. Leftism rewards victimhood and the New Jews have decided to be victims no more.

Melanie Phillips: An ancient spoon stirs American mischief against Israel

So why is the U.S., which claims to be Israel’s staunch ally, giving credence to a false Palestinian identity created to write the Jews out of their own history?

The Biden administration’s sympathy with the Palestinians is well documented. It has persistently refused to call them to account for their murderous aggression and incitement. It continues to fund them regardless of their “pay-for-slay” rewards to terrorists’ families. It forces Israel to undermine its own security in pursuit of a “two-state solution” that the Palestinian Arabs have refused for almost a century.

In creating a new role of special envoy to the Palestinians, for which it appointed a man with a record of profound hostility to Israel, Hady Amr, the administration upgraded the Palestinians’ status by giving them direct and public access to the U.S. government. It has also appointed other profound enemies of Israel to several prominent positions within the administration.

But what the Assyrian spoon transfer reveals is that the Palestinian Big Lie is being promoted as truth by none other than the Department of Homeland Security, which was created after 9/11 to protect America against terrorist attacks.

Far from being a key link in the chain of Western security, the DHS has internalized the fiction about Palestinian identity that is promoted as a principal weapon in the war of extermination against Israel—and is in turn the flag behind which march the Islamist foes of the West.

Noll said of the spoon transfer, “This is a historic moment between the American and Palestinian people and a demonstration of our belief in the power of cultural exchanges in building mutual understanding, respect and partnership.”

It was certainly a historic moment. What it demonstrated, however, was that the Biden administration is a far more profound foe of Israel and the Jews than most people have yet realized.

Zionism is more than just a viewpoint and passion - opinion

ZIONISM INSPIRES the Jewish people to this day, through heroes like the Maccabees, who fought for freedom in ancient Israel. It is what triggers mourning for the destruction of the Jewish temples in Jerusalem thousands of years ago.

Zionism is what powers the Jewish people’s ancient connection to the land of Israel, which is constantly reinforced by new archaeological findings. These discoveries date back to the times of King David, whose own Zionism led to him declaring Jerusalem as the capital of the Jewish nation, uniting that nation once again.

Zionism is what has accompanied the Jewish people through centuries of exile, crusades, conquerors, pogroms, persecution and the Holocaust.

Zionism is all the above and more. It is such a core element of the Jewish people that it is part of our religion, our oral and written history, our traditions and our national memory. It is an inherent part of our sense of peoplehood. Regardless of whether we live in Israel or not, or agree with the current Israeli government or not, Zionism is part of who we are.

While these clubs and others claim that their only goal is to boycott Zionists, the outcome of their actions is excluding and silencing Jews and Jewish voices on campus. An outcome that, if not confronted, could expand well beyond the halls of UC Berkeley.

These attempts to portray Zionism as merely a viewpoint are a transparent backdoor to excuse antisemitism - a backdoor that must be nailed shut. The way, to do so is to show the OCR and the world that Zionism is an intricate part of the Jewish people, their identity and their shared ancestry. Zionism must be recognized for what it is: an integral part of Jewish Identity not only by the OCR in its investigation but the wider public.

Buy the EoZ book, PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism today at Amazon!

Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424.

Read all about it here!

Palestinians Visiting D.C. Riot Upon Seeing Jews Approach Domed Structure (PreOccupied Territory)

Our weekly column from the humor site PreOccupied Territory.

Check out their Facebook page.

US Capitol Washington, January 12 - A group of tourists from villages around Ramallah and Tulkarm created disturbances in the vicinity of the US Capitol building Thursday when one of them spotted another group entering the rotunda-capped facility in traditional Hasidic garb, and reacted as accustomed when catching sight of such people entering a building with that architectural feature.

Seventeen Palestinians began yelling and throwing objects at students from an orthodox school visiting the Capitol this morning, witnesses reported, acting according to the precedent set by Palestinian behavior when Jews ascend the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, where two domed Islamic shrines occupy the Jewish holy site and Muslims object to permitting Jews entry, let alone worship, on the plateau.

"Jewish settlers are storming the... mosque-like thing!" shouted one, and began running toward the steps of the Capitol, but struggled to rush up the steps before the group entered the building and disappeared from sight. Slower-to-react members of the Palestinian group chose instead to throw bottles, food, and a random bag of trash in the direction of the Jewish group, but fell short. The Jewish group appeared not to notice the disturbance.

"Call Amnesty International!" cried one member of the Palestinian group. "Call Btselem! Hamas! The Morabitoun! The Morabitat!" referring to Islamist gangs that have tried to intimidate Jews away from the Temple Mount, and who enjoy moral support from Western progressives who see discrimination against Jews as an important element of their vision for human rights.

"They're desecrating it with their filthy feet!" shouted another, echoing Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in his alarm over Jews visiting the holiest site in the world for Jews, which Muslims appropriated by conquest in the seventh century and proceeded to neglect for most of the next 1300 years until Jews had the capacity once again to assert connection to it.

Capitol Police approached the group to determine the source of the disturbance, but took several minutes to find anyone calm enough to explain. Police briefly detained two of them but released them following cries of "Islamophobia!" and threats of legal action.

"I hope the people inside have stockpiled rocks, fireworks, and other weapons to resist the invaders," grumbled one of the group after the incident had passed its peak. "That's what the Al Aqsa experience tells us a holy mosque is for. In case it's needed, I volunteer to climb on the roof and urinate on it, to demonstrate Islam's exclusive claim to the sacred site."

Buy the EoZ book, PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism today at Amazon!

Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424.

Read all about it here!

01/12 Links Pt1: Biden tells Israel to give money to terrorists, not terror victims; Senior PLO Official: ‘Martyrs’ and Prisoners are ‘Most Precious Jewel’ for Palestinians

From Ian:

Ground Rules for U.S.-Israel Relations

rrive soon in Jerusalem to hold talks with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The visit will serve as an opportunity to agree on "ground rules" for U.S.-Israel relations. Israel is a sovereign country that formulates its policies on its own in view of the responsibility that history has given it as the state of the Jewish people and with the realization that the struggle continues over its existence, stature and security.

A strong Israel is a boon for the U.S., security-wise, technology-wise, and economically. Israel will continue to use its power to defend itself and will not allow its existence to be threatened. The U.S. should at the very least have our back. As for domestic issues, Netanyahu should make it clear that Israel is a vibrant democracy that sorts things out through the democratic process. There is no room for meddling and foreign influence by any side.

Iran's involvement in the Ukraine war only underscores the threat posed by it. Just imagine what it would feel it could do if it had nuclear capabilities. Not only has Biden's policy not restrained Iran, it also allowed it to continue with its efforts to advance toward military nuclear capabilities and to continue with its subversive efforts in the region.

Washington must take the prospect of rejoining the 2015 nuclear deal off the table for good and actively lobby to have snapback sanctions on Iran re-imposed, while also creating a credible military option. Such a policy will reduce the risk of a war breaking out in the Middle East.

Walter Russell Mead (WSJ): How to Restore American Influence in the Middle East

With Tehran's utter rejection of Biden administration efforts for conciliation and its wholehearted embrace of Moscow, U.S. and Israeli views of Iran have become more aligned. The long European romance with Iran is cooling as the regime's brutality at home and its collusion with Russian aggression in Ukraine sour European hopes for profitable and peaceful relations with the mullahs.

Higher energy prices have sent floods of cash into the Middle East, boosting the confidence of local rulers. China is working to raise its economic and political profile in a region essential to its future. The White House, feeling overstretched against Russian aggression in Ukraine and Chinese ambition in the Indo-Pacific, wants to minimize its exposure to the Middle East.

Yet the region is too important to ignore - and the more the U.S. withdraws, the more influence it sheds. As America becomes less relevant, regional actors feel free to make more decisions that Washington dislikes, effectively undermining U.S. influence around the globe.

If President Biden wants to restore American influence in the region, he can still do so. The price, however, is a resolute and effective U.S. policy to disrupt Iran's ability to threaten its Arab neighbors. If combined with measures to ensure that Israel and its friends can, if all else fails, take military action to block Tehran's nuclear program, this would put the U.S. back at the center of Middle Eastern order. The cost of influence is high, but impotence is more expensive in the long run.

Caroline Glick: Democracy must be restored to Israel

“For years now, Israel has seemed to me like a man sleepwalking toward a cliff. Now we’ve fallen from it.”

So proclaimed author Hillel Halkin in a hysterical requiem for Israel published last week in The Jewish Review of Books.

Halkin’s metaphorical cliff is the right-religious bloc’s electoral victory on Nov. 1, 2022 and the formation of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s sixth government two weeks ago. Halkin explained to his concerned readers that it isn’t that Israel stopped being a democracy on Nov. 1. Far worse. On that day, Israel lost its soul.

And Halkin identifies the culprit: Judaism.

In language redolent with antisemitic tropes, Halkin blamed “Judaism” for destroying “Zionism,” which he argued, oddly, “sought to cure us” of Judaism’s “fantasies and delusions … only to become infected with them itself.”

“Zionism wanted to make us a normal people,” he wrote. Alas, “It failed and grew warped in the process.”

American Jewish readers may have been shocked that the long-time Israeli darling of the neoconservative clique is now a hate-mongering leftist. But for Israeli readers, there was nothing original about Halkin’s essay. Since Nov. 1, the leftist-dominated Hebrew media has been consumed by the left’s collective nervous breakdown. Far more extreme messages than Halkin’s are shoved down the public’s throats 24-7. The charge is being led by politicians, retired generals and judges, and other members of Israel’s unelected, leftist establishment. The progressive U.S. foundation the New Israel Fund is reportedly funding and organizing the campaign.

The official Palestinian Wafa news agency reports:

Secretary of the Executive Committee of the PLO, Hussein Al-Sheikh, discussed with the US Special Representative for Palestinian Affairs Hady Amr, and his accompanying delegation, today, Thursday, bilateral relations, and political developments and developments in the region, especially after the results of the recent elections and the formation of a government. New Israeli.

Al-Sheikh stressed the need for a political horizon that preserves the two-state solution in accordance with international legitimacy, and for Israel to stop all its unilateral measures and daily attacks against the Palestinian people, which destroy this solution and create a difficult and complex atmosphere that affects security and stability.

And:

Prime Minister Muhammad Shtayyeh briefed the US Special Envoy for Palestinian Affairs, Hady Amr, on the violations and unilateral measures taken by the new extremist Israeli government against the Palestinian people immediately upon assuming power.

The Prime Minister said, upon receiving the US envoy, today, Thursday, in Ramallah, in the presence of the head of the Palestinian Affairs Unit, George Noll, "The US administration is required to move urgently to put an end to the unilateral Israeli measures and threats that undermine the national authority, and systematically end the possibility of establishing a Palestinian state ."

How do we know that the PLO isn't interested in a two state solution - except as a stage on the way of taking over all of Israel?

Because their logo says so.

How do we know that the PA is likewise not interested in a peaceful, two state solution that would end the conflict?

Because they are dominated by Fatah, and Fatah's logo says so:

Every hour of every day, Palestinian officials see this logo that says that Israel must be destroyed by violent means.

Everyone ignores this. Because of wishful thinking, when Palestinian officials say that they are law-abiding, against violence, and want to live peacefully side by side with Israel, US and EU officials swallow it all.

But in Arabic they say that they want the Fatah slogan, "Revolution Until Victory," which is on the signature of every Fatah communication.

The official Fatah party platform says that terror is a legitimate right.

What are the chances that these inconvenient facts are ever mentioned by the smiling diplomats from the US and EU that parade into Ramallah all the time for photo ops?

Exactly zero.

Now ask yourself exactly why this topic is off limits, when it is the core of the reason there is no peace.

Buy the EoZ book, PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism today at Amazon!

Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424.

Read all about it here!

The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs for the Palestinian territories wrote a report called "The humanitarian impact of 20 years of the Barrier."

It lists many reasons why Israel's separation barrier makes the lives of some Palestinians more difficult, highlighting farmers who need permits to work their land on the other side.

It is true - for a relatively small number of Palestinian farmers, the fence is a major inconvenience. There is nothing wrong with the UN highlighting their plight.

But there seems to be something missing from the analysis of a humanitarian affairs office.

The document begins with, "In 2002, the Israeli authorities started to build a Barrier with the stated aim of preventing violent attacks by Palestinians inside Israel."

By those criteria, was it successful?

Here are the number of Israelis killed in terror attacks, by year, from when construction began on the barrier:

The number of Israelis killed went down precipitously as the major parts of the barrier were completed.

It is hard to know exactly how much of the reduction was directly the result of the fence, of course; there were probably other factors. But according to one expert in the field, the barrier made all the difference:

Islamic Jihad leader Ramadan Shalah publicly admitted that Israel’s security fence is a significant obstacle to the Palestinian terrorist organizations. “If it weren’t there," he told Al-Manar Television, "the situation would be entirely different.”

On November 11, 2006, Shalah granted a long interview to Al-Manar TV, Hizbullah’s television channel. He asserted that suicide bombing attacks are the Palestinian people’s “strategic choice” and the terrorist organizations have every intention of continuing suicide bombing attacks, but that their timing and the possibility of perpetrating them from the West Bank depends on other factors.

“For example,” he said, “there is the separation fence, which is an obstacle to the resistance, and if it were not there the situation would be entirely different.”

According to the now dead Islamic Jihad leader, terror groups kept trying to blow up Jews and fully intended to continue, but the ugly wall stopped them.

Which means that the barrier has saved hundreds of Israeli lives - maybe thousands.

Now, why would the UN issue a report that only discusses how the fence is a detriment to Palestinian farmers' work, and not mention that it has largely fulfilled its purpose of saving many lives?

Unfortunately, the reason is because the UN doesn't consider saving Israeli lives to be a positive thing.

Buy the EoZ book, PROTOCOLS: Exposing Modern Antisemitism today at Amazon!

Or order from your favorite bookseller, using ISBN 9798985708424.

Read all about it here!

Sunjeev Bery is the Executive Director at an NGO called Freedom Forward. He was advocacy director for the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) at Amnesty International USA from 2011-2017. he's been interviewed on TV as some sort of expert.

For the past few days, Bery has been tirelessly tweeting his support for Ken Roth in the Kennedy School story - and going after Roth's critics.

Including me.

Which makes for some very entertaining reading.

Roth tweeted, "Harvard's Kennedy School says it 'welcomes new ideas—even unpopular and controversial ones." Its curriculum "encourages students and faculty to talk openly and effectively about difficult and highly charged issues.' Except for Israel, Dean Elmendorf?"

I responded to Roth, "Perhaps @Harvard @Kennedy_School has a policy against hiring obsessive liars? In 2014 I compiled a list of Ken Roth's Twitter lies over just a few months, and documented why they were wrong. He of course never corrected [any of] them. See for yourself," linking to a list of dozens of lies and distortions that Roth tweeted during and after the 2014 Gaza war.

Sunjeev Bery was very upset, apparently, at the tone of my list. "I started reading your "document" @elderofziyon, and it became clear within 10 seconds that it's a flimsy prop that enables you to just claim that people are liars. You are selling something that is far less than it actually is and using it for propaganda purposes."

Not knowing (or caring) who he was, I answered, "You are invited to tell me where I am wrong."

Instead of doing that, Bery wrote, "Many of the statements you make in your documents are simply claims and represent your beliefs. You seem to be adopting the posture that your claims are The Truth, and that those you disagree with are The Liars. Your intent is propagandistic."

Ah, so it isn't my facts - but my intent - that offends him. Good to know that human rights professionals are as little interested in the truth on Twitter as they are when they write their reports.

Then he hit me with what he considered his real zinger - which he used on other critics of Roth on the thread. "But here's the real question that tests your intentions: What are YOUR human rights criticisms of israel?"

It was already clear now that he was playing a game and had no interest in any semblance of truth, so I said I was done with the conversation: "So you cannot find a single example where Roth was correct and I was wrong. Out of several dozen. And then you want to accuse me of being disingenuous? Bye."

But this human rights professional brought out his inner teenage troll and kept trying to goad me. "Nice try buddy. Again @elderofziyon, what are YOUR criticisms of Israel?." I ignored him.

Another tweeter answered him, "He asked you a question in direct response to your criticism and you still didn’t answer. You should answer his question before you move on."

Bery answered him or her, "Wrong, buddy. If he can't say anything critical of Israel then he is ultimately a propagandist and a pro-government partisan arguing in bad faith."

I gave in and finally responded:

I'm not here for your amusement. I don't pretend to be anything but a pro-Israel site; I provide a tiny bit of counterweight to the tsunami of anti-Israel information out there. I am not a newspaper that pretends to be balanced. That being said, I strive to be 100% truthful.

To me, "bad faith" is accusing me of something and not being able to back it up, and instead changing the subject. THAT is a propaganda technique that the anti-Israel crowd does all the time; reframing the conversation instead of admitting mistakes.
I don't play those games.

After repeating himself for some reason, he gave me his one example of where my criticism of Roth was off-base to him with this screenshot:

By your own admission, you say that Ken Roth uses "the best available data" but because he doesn't include the caveats, you claim he is lying.

This is a totally bad faith argument on your part, and it is one of many many such examples in the document.

And so your overall document @elderofziyon lacks the substantive content necessary to justify your overall claim.

My reaction to the content of your document is that it serves the purpose of creating a propagandistic and misleading headline.

That is why I ask if you have any criticisms of Israel's policies that you are willing to state here publicly?
This is the test for differentiating an honest critic from a propagandist. A propagandist promotes a government and avoids mentioning any criticism whatsoever.

OK, at least he said something specific, even if it made no sense. I responded:

My 2014 article says "dozens of them were flat-out false, and others were knowingly deceptive." Your example is one of the deceptive ones - Roth stated the statistics AS FACT without saying "reportedly" or any other word newspapers would use.

Of course, he never corrected.

To defend that, and to cherry pick that out of all my examples that show how Roth DID lie multiple times, shows that YOU are the one who is being a propagandist. Is this the standard you accept for a human rights leader you have defended so energetically? That's pretty sad.

Bery:

No, I pointed out one example of many lies within your document in response to your request. There are many more examples of similar exaggerations.

But once again, you have failed to answer my question:

What are YOUR criticisms of Israeli policies?

The answer seems to be none.

Obviously he did not point out a single mistake or lie of mine. But I decided to answer his main question:

I defend my family publicly. I criticize them privately.

Everyone has biases. Every media outlet does, too. I admit mine -and the goal of my writings - upfront. Call it propaganda if you want, but I insist on honesty and transparency - which is much more than most media.

To Bery, this was the smoking gun! After a rehash of earlier arguments, he wrote, "Here's the reality, @elderofziyon. You are self-admittedly engaging in pro-Israel propaganda. You clearly state that you avoid making any public criticism of Israel, and that your only public comments on Israel are to defend its policies. "

Uh, yeah.

Yes. It is no secret. Wikipedia calls me a pro-Israel blogger. Not sure why that bothers you.

Ken Roth is also a propagandist, as I proved. But he insists there is no bias, which I have comprehensively shown he has.

And you are cool with that.

Bery's response to this graphic is priceless:

I bet many of Ken Roth's tweets regarding Israel are because he feels pressure to respond to propaganda accounts like yours constantly flooding Twitter with false claims.

So the only reason Roth treats Israel like the worst violator of war crimes is because people like me bother him!

Only then did I look Sunjeev up - and propaganda is his middle name.

Pot, meet kettle.

Sunjeev worked at Amnesty USA during the 2014 Gaza war. AI-USA said that Amnesty would correct any errors in their "Gaza Platform." I pointed out SCORES of them, calling terrorists "civilian." They ignored it.

Who is a propagandist?

His hilarious response was to paste my tweet where I admitted that I am a pro-Israel blogger. So damning!

Then I noticed that this "human rights professional" "Liked" a tweet that was pretty much at his maturity level:

So....it is propaganda when I defend one side, but it is perfectly OK to pretend to be an objective head of an NGO while "Like"ing tweets that say "Zionists love smelling their own farts"?

Bery then fell apart - yet defended it!

1. Zionists and Jews are not the same thing. It is anti-Semitic to conflate the two.

2. There are Christian and Hindu zionists. There are Jewish anti-zionists.

3. You are part of an organized troll strategy of amplifying your propaganda tweets, which I do liken to flatulence.

The guy who was trolling me for hours says I'm the troll!

I responded with my own numbered list:

1. Your Like proves that you are not the least bit objective. Just like your hero Roth.
2. If you don't know what objectivity means, then your defending Roth as objective is far funnier than a fart joke.
3. I wrote a book describing how today's anti-Zionism is a modern form of antisemitism.

4. This thread has proven to any observer that you have zero intellectual honesty.

He then said that I didn't answer him, presumably his non-sequitur that Zionists and Jews aren't the same: "Once again, you didn't respond to anything that I said. But that's cool. Keep up the propaganda! 👍 Your audiences are getting smaller and smaller 😊"

So I finished him and the thread off:

I never once claimed that Jews and Zionists are the same. Your reading comprehension is about the same level as your objectivity.
This thread will make a great post, though. Making a fool of a supposed human rights expert to the entire world is always fun!

His final response after bring proven a hypocrite with not the slightest interest in truth?

The troll couldn't handle being made a fool of.

But the most bizarre part is that while it is obvious that he said nothing at all to contradict a single one of my facts, ... he thinks he won!

Bery's entire argument is that to have any credibility, every Zionist must criticize Israel publicly and constantly. Obviously, he has no similar criteria insisting on "balance" for the anti-Israel zealots he admires and quotes.

I'm actually complimented that he keeps calling my writings "propaganda." Here is his response to the 2009 NYT op-ed by Robert Bernstein decrying how the organization he founded, Human Rights Watch, had gone off the rails by going after democracies like Israel that have checks and balances and downplaying the evil of the real human rights violators of the world:

I'll gladly share the insult with a true human rights giant.

The NGO Bery currently heads, "Freedom Forward," says it "seeks a world in which all people have the benefit of living in societies that are anchored in democracy and respect for human rights." It doesn't appear to actually do anything besides create "campaigns" against Israel and US Arab allies.

I wonder who funds it. The site is not very transparent about that.

Bery himself seems to have a soft spot for that bastion of democracy and human rights, Turkey.

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